Harry Ross is President of the Colorado Council of Genealogical Societies and is a past President of the Longmont Genealogical Society. He has been researching his family history since 1990. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Education from the Ohio State University and recently retired from Regal Entertainment Group, the largest Motion Picture Theatre company in the United States. He is a member of the National Genealogical Society, Longmont Genealogical Society, W. I. S. E., ISBGFH, Genealogical Speakers Guild and the Association of Professional Genealogists.

Joyce Homan

Joyce Homan is the Associate Director of the Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania and a Masters of Library and Information Science candidate at Drexel University. She is the former president of the student chapter of the Special Libraries Association, and a member of the National Genealogical Society, the American Libraries Association, and the Carpatho-Rusyn Society.

This week's Society Spotlight features the The Friends of Bohemian National Cemetery in Chicago, Illinois.

About Bohemian National Cemetery

At a mass meeting of the more than 20 Czech benevolent, fraternal, workingman's, gymnastic, and freethinkers societies on January 7th, 1877, Frantisek Zdrubek called on all Chicago societies to come together and create a "free national cemetery, where any Czech could be buried without regard to religion."

April 11, 1877 the Illinois Secretary of State issued the charter for the Bohemian National Cemetery Association articles of incorporation. According to this document the purpose of the Association was to provide suitable burial site for persons of Bohemian birth or extraction.

The cemetery is now open to people of all ethnicities and religions.

Spanning 126 acres, Bohemian National Cemetery has been called a beautiful Garden of the Dead and is a Chicago landmark and is listed on the National Registry of Historic Places. Rich with both aesthetic and genealogical information, the cemetery is the final home for over 116,000 people.

About The Friends of Bohemian National Cemetery

Friends of Bohemian National Cemetery is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization established in 2004 and is a separate organization from The Bohemian National Cemetery Association which operates the cemetery.

Our Mission: To promote the historical significance, enhance the beauty, and preserve the artistic heritage of Bohemian National Cemetery.

Our Vision: To create an appreciation of the cemetery in local, national and international audiences.

Friends has regular meetings with educational programs, conducts walking tours of the cemetery, and publishes a quarterly newsletter, Heritage Happenings. Friends also raises funds for the restoration and preservation of Bohemian National Cemetery.

Our editor, Matt Wright, continues to create an interactive publication geared to helping our member societies grow, while maintaining helpful information to individual genealogists. Here is just a short preview to what awaits you:

In addition, you'll find lots of great content in this issue:

A One-Step Portal for Online Genealogy, by Stephen Morse

Danish Immigrant Museum, by Diana Crisman Smith

Family Associations column, by Christine Rose

Genealogy 2.0 column, by Randy Seaver

Records Preservation and Access, by Linda McCleary

Book Reviews column, by Paul Milner

Subscribers can login to access their copy of the Summer 2011 issue, and two members of each member organization can also use their society's login ID and password to access their copies.

What? You're not a subscriber yet? FGS is offering a one-year subscription to the FGS FORUM, which is produced in electronic format (PDF), for $15 and a special two-year membership deal for $25. Learn more at http://fgs.org/forum and download a sample issue. You can subscribe online or print and mail your check.

This week’s episode hosted by Thomas MacEntee is entitled Your Society’s Facebook Presence. Using a Q&A format which was popular in workshops at the recent FGS 2011 conference, Thomas will review some of the issues involved with making sure your genealogy society can harness the power of Facebook. In addition, we’ll be highlighting the Elgin (IL) Genealogical Society in our weekly Society Spotlight feature.

Q&A Session on Facebook Issues Confronting Genealogy Societies

Has your society wanted to create a Facebook page to attract new members and to keep current members posted on society news and events? Do you have concerns about privacy or the proper way to create a solid Facebook presence?

Using a format of questions and answers which proved popular during various FGS 2011 conference workshops, Thomas will facilitate a discussion of issues and concerns facing genealogical societies. Come prepared with your questions and get ready to take notes - you won't want to miss this episode!!!

Sunday, September 18, 2011

FGS has a couple dozen printed (bound) syllabus left after the 2011 FGS/ISGS Springfield Conference. The syllabus is 552 pages in all. If you would like to order a copy, send a check for $40.00 (includes shipping) to:

Saturday, September 14, 2011
2-3pm Eastern US
1-2pm Central US
12-1pm Mountain US
11am-12pm Pacific US

Join us for the next episode of FGS Radio - My Society, an Internet radio show on Blog talk Radio presented by the Federation of Genealogical Societies. This week’s episode hosted by Thomas MacEntee is entitled TechSoup.org - Technology by the Bowlful for Non-Profits. Our special guest will be Ricci Powers, National Accounts Manager at TechSoup.Org. Ricci will explain how TechSoup.org works and how your non-profit society can reap the benefits of this amazing technology program. And we’ll be highlighting the The Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania in our weekly Society Spotlight feature.

Guest: Ricci Powers

Ricci Powers is National Accounts Manager at TechSoup.org. TechSoup has enabled nonprofits to save more than $2.6 billion in IT expenses since 2001. TechSoup.org is itself a 501(c)(3) nonprofit making 430 different product donations exclusively to other nonprofits and libraries from over from 45 donating partners (including Microsoft, Cisco, Symantec and Adobe) for an administrative fee which is usually 5% of retail cost. To qualify, organizations must be a 501(c)(3) nonprofit or a library.

Founded in 1892 as a non-profit organization, the Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania (GSP) was among the first in the United States to recognize the value of collecting and preserving the vital and personal records of those ancestors whose lives now comprise our American History. GSP is committed to preserving and publishing heretofore unpublished primary sources. The continuing dedication to this service enables the Society to make an increasingly significant contribution to the cultural life of our city, state, and indeed the whole country.

Concentrating primarily in Pennsylvania and its adjoining states, but also including immigration into and out of Pennsylvania, the Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania has research materials available to members through the Genealogical Collection at the historic Historical Society of Pennsylvania (HSP), accumulated by GSP and HSP and maintained in HSP's Library. Included are wills, deeds, census and tax lists, church registers, funeral, cemetery, and family Bible records, family papers and correspondence, as well as published genealogies, town and county histories, and periodicals. Comprehensive card catalogs in HSP's library at 1300 Locust Street provide an index by surname or locale for most of the collections. Much of GSP’s collections are itemized in the HSP online catalog.

A loyal corps of volunteers are collating and indexing church, cemetery, and other records, and are extracting genealogically important items from the Public Ledger (Philadelphia) 1834 - 1870.The volumes resulting from this work are placed in the collections and distributed to other research institutions.

Each year, the Society conducts conferences, alone or in conjunction with other societies, offering lectures for all levels of research. Lectures and/or field trips conducted by outstanding genealogists are sponsored by the Program Committee.

Thursday, September 8, 2011

The Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS) announces the creation of a new award to recognize and encourage a phenomenon garnering greater public attention: tourism and travel related to family history.

The FGS Genealogical Tourism Award has been established - through the work of the FGS Records Preservation and Access Committee (RPAC) - to recognize the promotion efforts of libraries, archives and other genealogy research sites as “go to” destinations.

Recently, more travelers are visiting sites relevant to their own family history and heritage as well as sites that can help them research their own roots. The FGS Genealogical Tourism Award seeks to recognize those promoters and organizations who excel at ensuring that such sites remain accessible to the public.

Pat Oxley, President of the Federation of Genealogical Societies states: “The preservation of, and our access to, the records upon which we as family historians depend is a source of constant and significant concern to our community. We have a vision of potential ways in which tourism organizations across the country might promote and encourage the use of genealogical resources within their regions.”
The first winners of the FGS Genealogical Tourism Award are:

Curt Witcher, Genealogy Center Manager, Allen County Public Library in Fort Wayne, Indiana, for his efforts in attracting 100,000+ visitors to the Genealogical Center each year, 85% of them from outside of Allen County. The indirect economic impact is estimated to expand the economy of Allen County by almost $7 million each year.

According to Snodgrass, “Building our site was truly a labor of love on the part of Jennifer Kalkman, our Director of Marketing Operations and her team. Every member of the interactive team played an important role in creating it. We intend to continue to grow the site and look forward to working with the genealogical community.”

The awards presentation was made at the Federation of Genealogical Societies’ 2011 conference in Springfield, Illinois during the Opening Session on September 8, 2011. FGS hopes to provide future Genealogical Tourism Awards each year at its annual conference.

Join us for the next episode of FGS Radio - My Society, an Internet radio show on Blog talk Radio presented by the Federation of Genealogical Societies. This week’s episode hosted by Thomas MacEntee will be broadcast live from the Exhibit Hall at the Federation of Genealogical Societies’ 2011 Conference in Springfield, Illinois. We’ll be interviewing FGS Board members, Official Bloggers, speakers, vendors and attendees about their FGS 2011 experience. We’ll also be highlighting the California Genealogical Society in our weekly Society Spotlight feature. Tune in to FGS Radio – My Society each week to learn more about genealogy societies and join in a discussion of the issues impacting the genealogical community.

This week's Society Spotlight features the California Genealogical Society.

The California Genealogical Society, organized in San Francisco on February 12, 1898, is one of the premier genealogical resources in Northern California. The Library is rich in genealogy reference materials, both standard and unique, covering people and places in California and the rest of the country. The Society offers research services, online one-of-a-kind genealogical indexes and databases, and a research library housing over 38,000 reference materials from California, the United States, and around the world.

The mission of CGS is to help people trace and compile their family histories. To accomplish this, the Society maintains a library, gathers and preserves vital records, disseminates information through its publications and internet access, and teaches genealogical research methods through meetings, seminars and workshops.

Please join us for ice cream social, Birds of a Feather Tables (ask us),
writing workshop, familysearch.org presentation, LSCAPG Roadshow Consultants,
Using School Records, Civil War-Tracing you Civilian Ancestors, DNA and
Genetic Genealogy, African American Research panel discussion, Texas
General Land Office, Genealogical Chaining of Artifcats, Working with
Foreign Records when You don't know the language, Civil War Research
Digitally, Clayton Library: Gem of the Gulf Coast, Houston's Treasures-
HMRC and GRE, US & Ships' Passenger Lists, and that's not all.
Finding and Using Manuscript Collections, Railroad History and Records,
Methods for Tracking, Southern Deeds, More than Land Records, and The WPA
Era-What it created for Genealogists, presented by Paula Stuart-Warren.